The lake, buried under more than 2 miles (3.7 kilometers) of Antarctic ice, has been seen as an earthly analog for ice-covered seas on such worlds as Europa and Enceladus. It's thought to have been cut off from the outside world for as long as 15 million years. But the latest results, reported in the open-access journal PLOS ONE, suggest that the lake isn't as sterile or otherworldly as some scientists might have thought.

More than 3,500 different DNA sequences were identified in samples extracted from layers of ice that have built up just above the surface of the lake.

Remember, it is the Templeton Foundation (they of the Templeton Prize) funding this research. This is just a wild-goose-chase that will add another pseudo-argument to the quiver: "See, Intelligent Design it is plausible. "Science" has looked for Dyson Spheres and didn't find any! Therefore we must be alone in the universe and therefore we must be the special unique creations of God."

An anonymous reader writes: The Raspberry Pi $25 PC alpha board has been caught on video. We see the alpha development board hooked up to a keyboard (USB), mouse (USB), and a display (HDMI). It's playing Inglorious Basterds off a 2GB SD card, in 1080p, using h.264 compression. And, importantly, the board was playing the video for 8 straight hours, proving both that its stable and that it won't overheat when put under load. The video also gives us a good look at the board, which packs composite video, HDMI, ethernet, dual USB slots, and an SD slot

quantr writes: ""Android is expected to surpass Apple in application downloads for the first time, according to research firm Ovum.Android could notch 8.1 billion app downloads this year, compared with 6 billion for Apple's iOS devices. That marks an explosion of growth for both platforms; Apple had 2.7 billion downloads and Android recorded 1.4 billion last year. The total number of application downloads is expected to grow by 144 percent this year, Ovum said in a report issued today.""

Having spent 2 days at a Renewable Energy conference talking to power generators, utilities and distributors recently, this is exactly what I asked of the people who are justifying building these projects.

Can the industry place some monetary present-value-of-future-worth on the reduced environmental impact from renewables? ANSWER: No

Unfortunately, while it seems logical that we should be able to take into account our children's children's fresh air/current coastline/climate/etc., nobody seems to be able to do this. Without some significant technological leap in efficiency or materials, it appears renewables cannot compete on a purely economic calculation without government subsidies. Unfortunately, that means we are dependent on the changing political will of each subsequent congress/administration.

What was particularly telling was the chart I saw showing MW of Wind Generation added per year. There would be significant installations (100s of MW) in one year, then almost nothing the next, because the Federal Installation Tax Credit was not renewed that year. The next year the installations spiked again due to new tax credits. The following year, bupkis, due again to no tax credits.

There are more targeted organizations to give your money to than a church if your goal is to help the needy. United Way, Habitat for Humanity, Red Cross come to mind. When you give your money to a church, however, you lose control of the end goal of your money. Presumably, some fraction will go to administrative costs (pastors would fall under this category) in either case, but churches do not exist solely for charitable causes. Your money will in some measure be supporting the message and recruitment of the churches next generation. This is the same issue with having the government handle your charitable money... the organization in question has many goals and once they have your money, they can funnel it wherever they want. For me, it is important to separate the message (potentially something like this anti-gay application) from the charitable action.